1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method for manufacturing a color filter, an apparatus for manufacturing a color filter, a color filter thus manufactured, an electrooptic apparatus having such color filter, and electronic device having such electrooptic apparatus.
2. Background Information
Display apparatuses have been widely used as devices for displaying information in recent years in notebook computers, mobile telephones, personal digital assistants, and other electronic devices. Liquid crystal devices in which a color filter is disposed on a substrate to enable full color display have become commonplace. Methods for manufacturing such color filters can be classified by the material of the coloring portion and the manufacturing process, and the inkjet method has been proposed as a way to manufacture a color filter in which a large number of color filters are formed on a substrate by discharging colored ink from nozzles. In the inkjet method, droplets are discharged to a target film formation area, the discharged droplets wet the entire target film formation area, and the droplets are allowed to dry to form a target film. Examples of known film formation methods using ink jetting include methods of forming luminescent portions that are disposed in a matrix form in a matrix display apparatus, and methods of forming the filter elements of a color filter substrate. Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application No. 2003-127343 discloses such methods. The pixel areas of the liquid crystal display described above are commonly formed in a rectangular shape. In this case, a plurality of droplets is discharged in the form of a matrix inside each pixel area.
However, it is ordinarily difficult to discharge droplets to the periphery of the pixel area, and the droplets are discharged to a position near the center of the pixel area. Since the distance from the edge of the droplet to the corner of the edge of the pixel area is far, it takes time for the discharged droplet to wet the pixel area by reaching all the way to the edge of the pixel area. There is also a drawback in that the droplets do not tend to spread to the edge of the pixel area due to the surface tension of the droplets discharged to the pixel area. The production efficiency of color filter substrates is therefore compromised. When drying begins before the discharged droplets wet the entire pixel area, it is difficult to form a color filter uniformly in the pixel area.
In view of the above, it will be apparent to those skilled in the art from this disclosure that there exists a need for an improved method for manufacturing a color filter, an apparatus for manufacturing a color filter, a color filter thus manufactured, an electrooptic apparatus having such color filter, and an electronic device having such electrooptic apparatus thus that overcome the problems of the known art. This invention addresses this need in the art as well as other needs, which will become apparent to those skilled in the art from this disclosure.